Pages tagged "neoliberal"

The Trump/GOP “Unified Framework” tax plan has something for everyone – if by everyone you mean the wealthy, corporate and non-corporate businesses and the alt-right. The plan embodies both the neoliberal class warfare that believes poor people have too much money and rich people have too little money and connects with the social conservative politics that the Trump and the GOP draws upon to mobilize its supporters.

The DSA Internationalism Committee released a report in April proposing that the Democratic Socialists of America either sever ties with or downgrade its status in the Socialist International, “an association of political parties and organizations which seek to establish democratic socialism.” The rationale of the Committee can be boiled down to four arguments: (1) that internationalism costs money, (2) that the DSA should disassociate itself from the policies and programs of the International, (3) that the DSA should disassociate itself from the austerity and neoliberal policies of some parties affiliated with the International in an effort to appease competing parties outside the International such as Podemos in Spain, Die Linke in Germany and SYRIZA in Greece and (4) that the International and the International Union of Socialist Youth (IUSY) routinely ignore the DSA and YDS. These arguments are factually problematic or otherwise unconvincing.

In spite of the economic boom for the wealthy, working people in the U.S. have yet to receive a significant improvement in their standard of living for over 30 years. At the same time, democratic forces are once again confronted with anti-immigrant campaigns- this time fostered and promoted by a president of the U.S.

As socialists, we stand with and among the U.S. working class in opposition to the rule of the transnational corporations and their exploitation of the economy and their despoliation of our lives, our society and our environment.

Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) is outraged but not surprised at the failure of the St. Louis County grand jury to indict Officer Darren Wilson for the killing of Michael Brown. The structural bias in our judicial and criminal justice system in favor of police who engage in violent action against unarmed Black and Brown people rendered the outcome unsurprising, yet still enraging. How can an unarmed person be killed by an armed police officer without there being a case for a criminal prosecution? The glaring injustice of the grand jury verdict is why tens of thousands of individuals across the country stormed into the streets after the announcement of the grand jury verdict. DSA joins others in demanding that the Federal Department of Justice continue its investigation into the conduct of the Ferguson police department and the possible violation of Michael Brown's civil rights by Officer Wilson and the department.

The politics of gender in Turkey have undergone significant changes under the Justice and Development Party (AKP) rule. Since it came to power in 2002, the AKP carried the decades-long neoliberal socio-economic restructuring to its final stage while imposing a conservative and increasingly Islamist worldview upon social, cultural and political spheres of life. At the heart of this conservative neoliberalism lies the reorganization of gender relations towards a more profound exploitation of women’s paid and unpaid labor. On the one hand, women’s increasing employment in flexible, insecure, low-paid jobs is celebrated as "women’s inclusion in the labor market." On the other hand, conservative discourses that sanctify motherhood and pro-family policies make sure that women remain the main if not the only providers of housework and care work. This dual process reinforces women’s double burden, as a gendered division of labor persists at home while a gender-segregated labor market becomes the economic norm.

OK, the April employment report continued the string of now 50 straight months of job growth in the private sector – almost unprecedented – and we’re roughly back to where we were in late 2007, just before the official beginning of the “Great Recession.” The top-line number for the report on April job creation was 288,000 new jobs and a decline in the unemployment rate to 6.3%. In many economic recoveries in the post-WWII years, this would be good news and worth celebrating. But the Long Depression that began in 2007 is far from over, and I don’t mean just that the number of long-term unemployed remains higher than in any other post-recession period or that the labor force participation rate is lower than at any time since the early 1980s, both of which are true. I mean the underlying problem, that the US economy is a failure in achieving the core goal of any modern economy: generating living wage jobs for all willing and able to work.

A Review of Chris Hayes’ MSNBC Special on the 50th Anniversary of the War on Poverty

By Joseph M. Schwartz

The Jan. 13, 2014 MSNBC Chris Hayes special on the 50th anniversary of the War on Poverty superbly demonstrated how the anti-poverty programs begun in the 1960s today take tens of millions of people in the United States out of the ranks of the officially poor. It also highlighted how addressing the needs of low-wage women, particularly by raising the minimum wage and publicly funding child care, would benefit men as well as women and children. Yet the program failed to analyze, in depth, how 30 years of bi-partisan “neoliberal” economic policies of deregulation, regressive tax cuts, defunding of social welfare programs, and anti-union policies have driven poverty rates close to those that existed before the War on Poverty.

The 2013 DSA convention, held in Emeryville, Calif. October 25-27, brought together socialists from across the country to rejuvenate DSA’s organizing capacity and reorient our strategy. The convention passed a resolution identifying DSA’s priorities for use of its resources during 2013-2015. The introductory paragraphs follow; click on the link at the end to read the full resolution.

DSA’s main task in the coming two-year period is to develop a plausible democratic socialist vision for social justice in the 21st century. We will challenge the attacks of neoliberal capitalist austerity on the rights and freedoms of citizens and on key government programs. We will elaborate this critique and vision in dialogue with fellow social-movement activists and organizations that oppose neoliberalism and seek a better life for all. A discussion of the changed political terrain and DSA’s basic strategic orientation in the coming two years will educate, empower, and grow our current activist core, while equipping DSA with intellectual tools appropriate to this century.

Join Steve Max, a founder of the legendary community organizing school, the Midwest Academy, to practice talking about socialism in plain language. Create your own short rap. Use your personal experience and story to explain democratic socialism. Prepare for those conversations about socialism that happen when you table or canvass. This workshop is for those who have already had an introduction to democratic socialism, whether from DSA's webinar or from other sources. Questions? Contact Theresa Alt <talt@igc.org> 607-280-7649.

DSA was concerned to find out that the company that provides our website and online organizing infrastructure, NationBuilder, had as a client the Trump campaign and other right-wing candidates. Progressives built this kind of infrastructure and tools for digital organizing and we have now lost that organizing edge. We are moving to identify other options for a CMS/CRM. As an under-resourced, member funded organization, this move will take time for us to carry out, but it is an important statement for us to make.